Quiet Weekend

It's been a quiet weekend around here. I needed that because of last week. One of the problems with foot surgery is the swelling that seems to take place at the drop of a hat for months afterward. Last week the temperature outside went way up. The humidity went way up. The barometric pressure went way up. And because of all this the measurement around my ankle and foot went way up. My foot was at least double its normal size and I ended up not being able to get my shoe on for several days. This also meant a lot of pain and basically a really cranky Jill.

To make up for this I've been sitting around most of the weekend except for early morning yard work.
Sitting around means 2 things:
1. Knitting
2. Cats hanging around (or on) me

This picture is terrible for color but I started a pair of Pink Ribbon socks out of Lion Brand SockEase in a bright pink called Cotton Candy. These socks will go into an auction for Breast Cancer that a friend is part of every year.

I also worked on the May mystery sock for SKA. This is a group on Ravelry - Sock Knitter's Anonymous. I haven't done anything with them so far but this month the mystery sock was by Cookie A and I thought it would be fun to try. I finished the socks a few days ago with Chief's wonderful assistance but I haven't gotten around to taking pictures. The best I did so far was to get a shot of Chief helping me by laying across the computer and randomly hitting keys.

If the boys aren't on top of me they are near. I have a chair that sits by the recliner and put the computer on it when its not in use. If the computer isn't on the chair - the boys are. They feel the need to monitor my knitting and I fully approve. There's nothing better than a 2 second break from knitting to scritch a fluffy head or tummy.

From the Boys and me - have a great Memorial Day and be sure to take some time to remember those who have served to protect us whether in the military or civil service.

Thanks Dad, both Grandpas, Uncle Bud, Uncle Bob, Uncle Werner, cousin Paul, SIL Jan (Fire Captain)and all the others in the family that give your life and time for the rest of us!

Morgan's Hat

First some quick business -
1. I've been getting comments in Japanese that when I translate them are obviously not anything having to do with the blog. So I turned on the comment moderator for a while till the Japanese comments quit showing up.
2. No. I don't read Japanese. I used an online translator.

One thing that happens on Ravelry is amazing. We all join some forums (or a lot of forums) and end up making friendships with people from all over that we would never meet in a million years. I hang out in the She-Knits Podcast forum where we have daily Small Talk and a core group of us have developed a very tight bond. Many of us have met in person. Many have brought their friendships to personal emails and trading yarn & gifts. Most important, when someone in the group has a need we're all there for that person. This group kept me sane while recovering from the foot surgery last month.

Little side bar - today was my first day of work and my foot is pooped! I walked a bit more than I should have and need to be more careful the next few days while getting back to "normal".

Back to the group - one of the ladies in the group has a cute little daughter who has been dealing with problems requiring brain surgery way too frequently in her young life. She's headed for more surgery and will need to keep her head (incision site) covered while it heals so some of us from the group are making hats for Morgan.

I finished my hat tonight. It's made out of some KnitPicks Shine I had from last year when we made a group afghan. It's a nice soft cotton yarn so I hope it feels good on Morgan little head.
I only wish the camera colors were a little closer to the real colors. The main color is called Bachelor Button.

Her Mom says she's not too girlie and likes socks froma web site that had some funky graphic designs so I hope the combination of just a little lace and some some graphics will make her happy.

Farewell to January

I'll be glad to say good bye to January in one way and sad in another. I spent all of January with my foot surgery and staying in the house recovering so I am glad to be now getting out a bit and seeing the "real" world again. But - I also spent January relaxing, decompressing from the stresses of everyday life and getting some knitting done with no guilt about other things I should be doing. That part I'll miss a lot.

Stress free is a good thing and I hope one thing I learned this month is that I need to allow the problems of the world to stay away from my den. So, I don't do new year's resolutions but this year I'm going to try and keep problems out of the den. When I come in here - the world doesn't. Let the kitchen table be the place for bills and life problems and let the den be a place for knitting, friendship, relaxing, etc. My little safe zone in the world.

My view of the outside world this month was through the window in the den (and the TV). All I worried about was seeing whether there was new snow on the roof of the house behind me. I was lucky this month and we had so little snow I didn't even have to hunt up someone to shovel the driveway/walkway. I hope February stays the same.

As I said earlier I did knitting this month. A few days ago I started a new sweater. I can tell I'm feeling better cause I burned through 2 skeins in 3 days. Much quicker knitting than the beginning of the month when it took me 2 weeks to go through 1 skein.

The sweater has cables on the front along with a yoke filled with "berries". The back is plain rev. st. with the berries yoke. I've knit a lot of berries the past few days with many more to come!

As for the Boys - they're off sleeping somewhere. (what a surprise).

Knitting meets Camera

I finally got my camera, my knitting and my ambition together at the same time so - we have pictures.

First up - the Wonderball Shawl. You may remember for Christmas my knitting cousin gave me a Wonderball. I had a problem deciding what to knit because I didn't know what kind of yardage it had so - I decided on a shawl and if worse came to worse I could add yarn from my stash.

Size 10 1/2 needles - Cast on 5 sts and I did the yarn over increase at each end and either side of the center stitch. I did the whole shawl in knit so it's a garter stitch.
When I came to some of the yarns they definitely had a right side and wrong side. Check out the light purple fringe stripe. Once I knit that yarn I pulled all the fringe to the right side. The yellow/teal stripe is fun fur but that fulled in enough so I didn't need to pick any to the front.

Besides not knowing what yarn will "show up" next the Wonderball includes presents wound in the ball throughout.

I ended up getting 5 presents: a crocheted bunny which was at the very center, a felt pin cushion, silk ribbon, a crystal Christmas ornament, and stitch markers. The stitch markers and crystal gave me some problems because they popped through long before the whole item so I had to be careful pulling yarn around the sticking out part.

But - it was fun to knit and an adventure to see what yarn or present would show up next. Had me thinking about making some Wonderballs of my own for presents to fellow knitters.

Other knitting?

I started making some bath mitts to create spa baskets for presents. No time like the present to get started on next year's presents.

This mitt is Sugar'n Cream and the pattern was on the ball band.

One friend stayed with me at the hospital the whole day during my surgery - drove me there and home so I decided to make him a pair of Elizabeth Zimmerman's Woodman's socks. These socks are great for outdoor Minnesota winter activities. One sock down - one to go.

Slow but sure. I'm making the Tree of Life Afghan. It's been sitting next to my chair all month so when I have nothing else to do I pull it out and work on a few rows. So far I'm over half done

The second pattern is a flower garden and supposed to be 4 flowers high but - the leaves are yarn pulled through making long strands. To me it's asking for someone to get their fingers, toes, etc. caught in it and that would pull the stitches out of shape making the afghan look ugly. I came to this decision after a couple flowers and changed the pattern up a little. It only has 3 rows of flowers and I added another little design above it to keep the length of the whole afghan.

What I really like about this afghan is the tree of life pattern. The afghan has 4 of these across and repeats it at top and bottom and in the middle.

I can't go a complete post without mentioning the foot. It's been 2 1/2 weeks since my surgery and I'm finally starting to walk around a little. I also managed to stand in the shower a few times and it feels SO good to be really, really clean! My walking around is usually to the kitchen and back to my chair followed by a nap or at least sitting around for 2-3 hours to recover. My foot no longer looks like something out of a bad horror movie but it has a new feature that amuses me.

Three weeks ago my 2nd toe was the same length as my 3rd toe. No more. My toes is now longer than all the toes, it sticks out past the big toe even. This length comes at a cost. It no longer bends. When I bend the toes of my foot all the others bend as they should and the 2nd toe stays sticking straight out. Good thing it wasn't the 3rd toe or people would think my foot my giving them the finger!

Proof of Life

Well, it may not be proof of life but it is proof of knitting. I finally got around to blocking a few of my finished items but the sun did not cooperate today so the pictures are flash and house lighting instead of nature light.

When I downloaded the pictures I realized I still had some pics from work in the camera so I thought you might like to see one of the old printers my team uses to create black & white booklets, brochures, etc.

The left side where the guy is standing is the paper trays along with 3 more trays just to the right of the "bump". This printer can hold 9 different types of paper. Different size, color, weight, tabs, etc. So if you have a book that has a cover, tabs, color paper inserts, etc. - this guy will print is all at once and spit it out complete.
The bump is the printer.
To the right of the extra paper trays is stapler. It staples and loads the finished copies in the window area.
Next, is a stacker. When you do all those tabs, chapters, colored inserts, etc. and its done - it ends up in the stacker waiting to be taken out.
Finally, the last big unit is the booklet maker. It takes finished copies staples the whole thing together, folds it and then trims off the extra edge you get when you fold it.

So - There you have it. An older but still very functional printer. Next time you get a booklet that was printed with a colored cover and the rest black & white it may have been printed on a machine like this one.

Knitting

A while back I finished a shawl out of Mini Mochi. It's simple and lets the yarn do its own thing. The lace edge is Cascade Hertiage Sock because I felt the lace pattern would have been lost with Mini Mochi.
The full size picture is closer to the actual colors. The pattern is Eliina shawl. More info is on my Ravelry site.

I also finally blocked the Alita afghan. This was made from a lace doily pattern with Woolease yarn. My hope was to make an afghan that was a bit special for my couch when company goes because I like to keep the house cool. It needs to be kept away from the couch until then so it remains fairly cat hair free.

And - yes - I block with the iron. Lots of steam, a bit of heat and a light hand. So far I have yet to kill the yarn and things come out looking great.

Best Sleeping Positions

Every once in a while you look at your world and decide some changes need to be made. You have an old car that costs more to fix than its worth. You have piles of things on the table so it can't be used. You're in a loveless marriage and need to get out. My world is not so dramatic.

My big thing I need to change is my wardrobe. I think its time to make a new night gown. This one is over 15 years old and looks everyday of it. Mom is probably rolling over in her grave seeing me wearing something this raggy!

I may not have made a new nightgown lately but I have made progress on some knitting. I found a Lace Edge Hat pattern I liked and made it out of Malabrigo. It's yummy and wonderful. After I made the hat I decided to come up with some gauntlets that would match. First one is done and of course I didn't take any notes on my increases and such so I've been going a little slower making the second one. Turns out I have enough Malabrigo to make a small scarf also. Once I get the scarf finished I'll write these up and share them with you all. I'll also hunt up the hat pattern source so you can make a complete set.

While I've been knitting the Boys have been doing what they do best - sleep.

Bert likes to sleep on top of the TV cabinet. Here's his favorite pose. I know its because the the heat that comes from the cable box in the cabinet but its still pretty funny.

Even when he hears something he manages to check it out without losing "The Pose".

Once he's sure everything is safe and there's no real live person coming into our cave he relaxes and settles down to some serious sleeping again.

Don't ya just love the hind foot action!

Meanwhile, Chief sleeps where Chief sleeps best - on the recliner between my legs.

The black thing on the bottom of the picture is my laptop. I can handle Chief on the right arm of the chair, Bert on the left arm, the lap top of (of course) my lap and knitting in front of the computer. What else do you need!

Life is good around here if you ignore my nightgown!

Staycation

First off - sorry about the bad picture. While I was driving this week I noticed the car was about to roll over to 50,000. I grabbed my cell phone and managed a picture while driving in rush hour (do not attempt this at home!) . However - in the process, as I took the pic a car decided the 1/2 car space in front of me was his and I had to hit the brakes. Result - bad pic.

50K miles later I still love my "car". It's a Saturn Vue (SUV) and I was very worried during the GM trauma this past year when they talked about Saturn going away. Luckily it was sold and will still be around for us. People who own Saturns tend to be loyal. Just ask my cousin (on his 2nd), my Aunt & Uncle, my Dad (well- you can ask but he wouldn't remember), or other friends who have Saturns. We love them. I loved my L200 and when I got a good deal to trade up - I jumped on it. Here's to 50K more years.




Today I went for a ride over to the area St Paul . There's a spice store (Penzey's) over by the Yarnery and I decided a road trip would be fun. Penzey's is about 4-5 blocks east of the Yarnery so I headed over there first. Easy parking (15 minutes) because it is a bit away from the main Victoria/Grand shopping area. I didn't plan on being in too long so 15 minutes worked well.

I ran in, browsed for spices, grabbed a catalog as they have great on line store, and left a few minutes later with some needed spices. I don't know if I'd ever make a special trip there again but, I'm on staycation and it was an adventure.

Somehow on the way back I ended up on Summit Ave. (one block off Grand) and found a few homes for sale that I thought might be big enough to hold my stash and other junk (precious bits of life memories).





What do you think? Would you be able to find enough room here for the stash? Just think - top floor could be all crafts. One room for the stash, a room for a knitting retreat, one for sewing, one for the knitting machines..... I'm sure with today's economy the price would be nice and low and easy to finance. Maybe you like a stone house instead.





This one is for sale also. That front jut out area on the right - looks like a great place to have a knitting group meet. Just saying....


These pictures were also taken with my cell phone while driving. I discovered its much easier to take pictures while driving if you are going under 30 MPH and nobody is trying to cut you off!





You may have noticed- no mention of what I got at The Yarnery. Well.... after driving down Summit I turned right toward the freeway and after I was partway home I realized I didn't go back to Grand and stop at the shop. Guess I'll have to make another trip sometime this week.





Knitting Pictures



There are no knitting pictures.
I started making the Bella Mitten and decided I didn't like the look I was getting. RIPPED.
I started knitting knitting the Fake Fair Isle Hat - didn't like the 2 colors I picked out - RIPPED.
I started a sock-Bloomin' Socks . The yarn is OK for the pattern but there's so little knit that I didn't bother to take a picture.

So, of course, when there's no knitting pictures - throw in a cute kitty picture.
For some reason Bert has decided this week that he loves to sleep on the humidifier. It can't be comfortable, can it?
The only thing he likes better is in the winter when the humidifier is running and he tries to attack the source of the mist.

It's my special place and I WILL protect it! - Bert

Oh - FYI - work managed to go 6 hours without calling me with a problem. This was after I told them I would not be available cause I was going up north where the cell phones dont' work. Small lie but I really want to ignore work for a week! The reason for calling - they couldn't find the password to the voice message on the phone. That would be the post-it note that was left attached to the side of the phone right where I showed them it would be. Oh - nevermind.....

It could have been a great post

Last summer when I met up with Sharon (She-Knits) she gave me some bath bombs from LUSH. One of them was still hiding out in my bathroom and I decided I needed a little spa time. I rarely take a bath (don't worry I DO take showers) but a nice soak with a book seemed like the thing to do today, especially after I saw the bath bomb.

So - I filled the tub. Got a book to read, my reading glasses and dropped the bomb. It was fizzy and filled the bathroom with wonderful smells. I read and relaxed.

After the tub dried out it must have smelled nice because the boys decided hop in the tub and take their own bath. I came in only to see both of them in the tub cleaning themselves and each other. It was so cute. I got the great idea for a blog post about all parents getting pictures of their kids in the bathtub, the boys using the tubs but not quite understanding how the bath thing was supposed to work. In my head it was a great post. I went to the next room to grab the camera. They kept cleaning. I turned the camera on. They kept cleaning. I set the camera to indoors and started to aim it at them - they both jumped out of the tub faster than you can imagine. Almost a synchronized jump type thing worthy of the Olympics.

Somehow the effect just isn't the same without the boys.

What? You think we want people seeing us do our private stuff!? - Bert

In knitting news - what do you get if you play around with ugly yarn and short rows?

A very strange face.

I'm getting close to being able to show you the brown blob that is going to be a lace afghan. I'm on the last crochet edge round but ran out of yarn 1/3 of the way around. Maybe I'll get the yarn tomorrow and be able to show you the finished afghan.

Lots of Knitting - No pictures

Knitting is happening around here - just no picture taking. I'll get them shortly but - here's what's been on the needles....

Teddy Bear.
Simply Knitting had the cutest teddy bear a few month's ago. I saw it and HAD to make it. He is wearing a onesie and has a collar and ruffle going down the front. My cousin's daughter is having the first baby of the next generation so - the bear got made and I'm all excited for the end of May to come and the baby shower. He's made of Woolease so he can be washed.

Hot Pink Baby.
Also for the baby (its a girl). I made a cute little cardigan in Louisa Harding Fauve. The bottom is lace and it should fit this fall.

Tree of Life Afghan.
The afghan is about 1/3 done made out of Woolease- natural color. The second section is supposed to be flower but I found them terrible to make. It was supposed to be 4 repeats but after 3 I decided to stop and look for another design to knit for a smaller section. Definitely need to save my sanity. The afghan is in time out while I hunt up a new design for about 40 rows.

Opal Circus Socks.
These are my traveling socks. They've been to the doctor's office with Dad, friends house for the Oscars, knit night, and around town. I haven't worked on them at home and so they haven't gotten too far. I'm starting to get sick of pulling them out of the knit bag so it's time to concentrate on finishing these up. I've got 2 inches left on the cuff of the first one and may put them into time out for the 2nd while I knit some socks in cotton for summer. These are Opal Zirkus-wool.

Icelandic Shawl.
Almost done. This shawl is Knit Picks Skimmer and right now looks like a blob. I have 10 rows of the border and then this puppy gets blocked like mad!

Finally, The Mitered Sock Squares- it's not a blankie- project.
As I add more and more mitered squares this looks more and more like its becoming a blankie but I still firmly believe it wants to be something else. It hasn't told me yet but, I'm patient. It will tell me when its ready.

Like I said - lots of knitting- no pictures. I need to get the camera out and get a few new pictures to show off all this work. Maybe tomorrow.

Signs of.......

Signs of Spring

Everyone always sees pussy willow branches with the cute little buds that are so fun to "pet" and feel nice and soft like bunny feet or kitty feet. But as springs moves along the little buds grow up and well - explode into millions little feelers. I always thought this looked so cool.

Another sign of spring I look forward to is the Boys hanging out by the open window. They LOVE watching the activity in the back yard. Important stuff like the leaves I didn't rake last fall blowing around or the birds looking for the seed I haven't put out yet.

Guess all the signs of spring mean I have some work to do outside to get the yard ready for summer..... but.....instead......I have my own sign of spring.

MY Sign of Spring

For some reasons spring usually means I start a million new projects that are totally unrelated to getting the yard cleaned up. I think I'm in denial of all the work.

What do we have here?

Why, yes, that's a side table filled with knitting projects. We have a hot pink baby sweater on the top.

The green in the front is my Soft Shoulders cable sweater I started in 2003- it reappeared from time out about 6 weeks ago.

The baggie is sock yarn left over from all my socks. I've been miter knitting but I keep telling people its not going to be a sock blankie. When it ends up to be 5 feet by 6 feet maybe I'll admit its a blankie.

The light blue under the baggie is my Icelandic shawl. I'm up to the border which is a lot of stitches and really wide.

Between the shawl and the baby sweater is an off white Tree of Life Afghan.

In the front is my iPod TV controls and my laptop is sitting on the chair in front. Frequently the laptop sits on my lap while Chief sits between my legs on the recliner -sleeping and purring.

Not showing is a few socks and other projects.

But that's just one side of the chair - the other side....

That table holds knitting needles, knitting magazines and pop. Frequently on top of this whole pile sits Bert.

Hopefully by summer a few of these projects will be in the finished list and somehow the yard fairies will magically rake and clean up the garden.

Fairies? Where are you???

Lots of Knitting - No pictures

Interesting that it would take me 11 days after a post on procrastination to post again. Told you I put things off...

I spent the past week finishing up a secret project. Don't you just love it when people talk about secret projects they can't show you. After a while you start things maybe they're just making it up to hide the fact that they aren't doing anything. Well - there really is a project. It's done and heading to its new home tomorrow. Once I know its been opened I'll post pictures and the story behind it.

Beside the secret project I've had a pretty busy knitting week. Tuesday was MN Knitters Guild meeting. The topic was Aran knitting and there were many beautiful items to enjoy. I haven't joined the guild but only because I used my last check and keep forgetting to put a new bunch in my purse. Next month....

Thursday was my regular knit group - NW Twin Cities Suburb Knit Group. We started through Raverly and our group just keeps growing. We started once a month and now meet twice a month. It's amazing how many stories you hear about groups starting up because of Ravelry. I brought the project to work on and others brought socks, afghans, sweaters and all sorts of fun projects.

Since spring is officially here I've been looking at the yard (minus snow) and realized how little I did last fall before the snow fell. I put off racking because we have some late leaf droppers in the area and I didn't want to have to rake twice. OOPS! Now I have a really icky looking yard and a lot of work ahead of me in a week or so when the yard dries out enough to be able to handle a raking.

The next month will also be busy knitting wise. Knit Out, my knitting group, MKG, and we'll see what else comes up. Next post will have pictures - I promise!

You want me to knit WHAT?!?

This weekend was busy.

We got snow - I got to shovel.

The MN Knitter's Guild had a tea - I got to knit with friends and eat little fancy sandwiches.

The Oscars were Sunday - I got to knit with friends and eat little fancy appetizers.

I definitely enjoyed the after shoveling activities more.

Oscars & the Mallow Throw

My core group of friends have been together since elementary school. We still get together very frequently. For the past over 30 years two of them have hosted the Oscar party and formerly Mallow Throw. Back when we were young and foolish we would all bring a bag of marshmallows to the party. The hosts would prep their house with a lot of plastic tarps to protect the floor and furniture.

When the show started the main rule was - if you thought the speech went on too long, or the dance number was stupid, or the person was wearing ugly clothes, or you just happened to be a little bit bored - you threw marshmallows at the TV (and frequently at the person across the room from you). By the end of the night the apartment was coated in mallow dust and I'd usually come home with white goo in parts of my body that shouldn't have white goo.

We've aged and matured. The topic of discussion this year was - "Hey Jill, did you think you could knit some marshmallows for next year?" R, the friend I sort of taught to crochet, thought he could take up crochet again to make some mallows. Maybe we haven't matured THAT much.

MN Knitter's Guild

So I finally decided I wanted to go to the MKG. They had a Sunday afternoon tea and I figured that would be a great way to go the first time. I got one of the ladies from my NW Burb knit group to come with me and off we went. When I got there people couldn't have been nicer. I saw a few people I recognized and then saw a couple of ladies that belonged to the same machine knitting group I went to back about 10+ years ago.

Next month is aran knitting. Should be fun.

Hairpin Lace

A friend posted a picture on Ravelry of a shawl. She wondering how it was knit. When I looked at it I knew right away it was hairpin lace - crochet. I had done a little of it back in college (you know - before home computers were invented). I told her what it was and the next weekend I found my hairpin lace fork. That started me off on a new adventure. I figured out the shawl and posted a picture of my ugly little sample with Chief. That was just the beginning.

Make that a VERY ugly sample. Anyway - I've been playing around with hairpin lace this week and came up with a few new patterns. I'm debating sending one of the in for magazine submission (after all I have a whole week before its due). Because of this I can't post pictures. If I don't send them in, I'll let you see what I've been playing with. Time will tell....

Bags, Socks and MItts

As I've mentioned before Chief likes plastic. He lives for me throwing a bag on the floor to play with and chew on. Well, now he's started something new. He doesn't just play with them - he is now picking them up, carrying them places to sit on and protect. I'm not sure if this is "just because" or because I cleaned up all the extra bags when I was getting ready for Thanksgiving. Whatever the reason, he is being very careful to keep me away from the current bag which includes carrying it to the bathroom in the middle of the night to sit on.

"What!? It's my bag and you can't have it! - Chief

In knitting news, I finished the Eagle's Flight socks last week and finally got a pic of them. It's really hard to get a picture without showing massively white legs and scaring everyone. As I mentioned last post - I increased the stitches on the last row of the leg (I knit toe-up) so that the edge would not be too tight. This sock fits perfect.


For my birthday Christine gave me a kit to make Cat Bordhi's Flying Carpet Socks. They're made with Mountain Color Bearfoot- Mountain Tango colorway and Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sport Yarn- Tahoe colorway. They're made using techniques from the New Pathway for Sock Knitters book and are lots of fun. I have the first sock done but the pictures just don;'t show the cuff properly. Head to the link and you'll see a much better pic!

In other knitting news, I've been pining over the loss of one of my patterns. Back many, many years ago I got Elizabeth Zimmermann's Woolgathering with several mittens in it, including the mitten below. A garter stitch beauty that hugs the wrist, has a mitered thumb and just plain fits and feels great. I made tons of these including the one below that never quite got finished. Fast forward 20 years and I decide to make some more which was prompted by finding this guy when I moved and sorted out boxes of "stuff".

I found the pattern which included 3 mittens but the page with this mitten - missing! I looked, I cried, I emailed Schoolhouse press and got no answer. I put a message up on the EZ group in Ravelry- everyone was interested but no one had the pattern. I've counted stitches on this one and come up with what I think will be close but - there's some special fitting to the mitten and I can't quite see how I did things.

If anyone has this pattern I'd love to hear. I believe it's Woolgathering #6 - Mittful of Mittens. The other 2 patterns include the Norwegian mitten. It's one of the WG that were 8.5x14 paper folded in half.

In the meantime - Chief has decided his plastic bag is safe and decided to join me at the recliner.
Bert? - he's running around jumping on things right now. Oh to be young and energetic!